Reading disorders in children.

Abstract

To the Editor:— In his letter ( 207 : 369, 1968) on your editorial ( 206 : 638, 1968) on reading disorders in children, Lloyd J. Thompson, MD, distinguished the various concepts of organicity (brain damage), psychogenesis (environmental), or constitutionality (geneogenous), associated with faulty neurological integration. This latter term is preferred by us, 1 since it obviates any concern about brain damage; and is inclusive of many diverse factors in perceptual disorders, namely, hyperkinesia, lethargy, behavior deviations, clumsiness, short attention span, impulsivity, reading disorders, and/or other academic problems. Ubiquitous references to reading disability or dyslexia as an entity, sui generis, tend to obfuscate its dominant, integral relationship to the perceptually handicapped individual. In construing dyslexia as an inherent part of a perceptual syndrome, genetically determined, the physician can orient his approach longitudinally during the growth and developmental stages of infancy and childhood. Incipient disorders in maturational development of young children can then be apprehended at